


and the land is dark

by Mysecretfanmoments



Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Eventual Fix-It, Gen, Post-Canon, spoilers for game ending within the first paragraph
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-10
Updated: 2017-12-25
Packaged: 2019-01-15 16:40:12
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 9,452
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12324846
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Mysecretfanmoments/pseuds/Mysecretfanmoments
Summary: Noctis wakes up at the start of his journey, his memories intact.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Nanali](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nanali/gifts).



> You know what they say: nothing says "happy birthday" like the angsty start to trying to fix the FFXV ending so Noctis doesn't have to suffer as much (then making him suffer more). 
> 
> Happy birthday to my most precious Nanananali. What can I say? You... are the best!

Sun beats down on his head like a molten crown, sweat trickling down the collar of his shirt. He takes a breath full of dust and feels his body around him. _His body_ … That’s not right. His body is gone, ripped to pieces for the final push against Ardyn. If there’s anything left of him it can only be a thought, a memory, something the others keep alive inside of themselves. He can’t be… he’s not…

A touch on his shoulder scares him, makes him shock up and open his eyes. He does have a body. It’s _his_ body, the years sloughed off, still familiar in its way. He sets his palms against his thighs, stares in blank incomprehension.

Gladio is saying something. _Gladio._ He’s griping. _Car’s not gonna move itself._

Shock like ice bubbles up through his veins, becomes armour against the intense heat. He _remembers_ dying. It _hurt_. It hurt, but he was resigned to it; by the end the promise of no more pain was all he had left. He was never going to see these people again, never going to see anything again, and somehow he’d scraped together enough of his courage to face that future of nothingness.

Beside him, Prompto is complaining. Noct sees him when he turns his head, time slow like in a dream, the scene heartbreakingly familiar.

This isn’t real. It’s not happening. It happened already, in a different lifetime—but Noctis moves as if possessed, getting up and walking to the side of the car. He hears Prompto’s whining, sees Ignis in the driver’s seat. They’re acting like this is real, and normal, and happening. His hands grip at the car’s frame the way they did then, like it’s programmed in. He can’t say anything; his voice doesn’t work, but he hears the others. He leans into the vehicle, pushes harder than last time because it’s something to hold onto.

He’s here, in his body, in his world—ten years ago. With people he already mourned.

He doesn’t say anything. He can’t. His throat and nose are clogged, breaths difficult, but he listens. Cheerful teasing, questions, groaning. Over time the tide of their talk becomes lopsided, lacking a participant—lacking him. But they manage to limp through it, ribbing each other, attempting to rib him and being met with silence.

“What’s gotten into you?” Gladio groans from the back of the car. “You pulling your weight all of a sudden?”

None of this can be real, but gods, gods, Noctis wants it to be. He wants to be back with them, in his world. He wants it to last forever, for the dream to continue. It’s not a memory; it’s already split from what he remembers, the guys looking at him like he’s a stranger, but their realistic response only makes it worse. Makes it seem real.

“Stop,” Gladio says. Prompto doesn’t need to hear it twice, but even he isn’t huffing and puffing dramatically like he was last time. All of them are staring, silent and questioning now, their levity gone.

Noct keeps hold of the car, but he stops pushing. Ignis is looking up at him, eyes clear behind his glasses—glasses he wears because he can’t stand the tiny bit of blurriness in his natural eyesight. Noct feels like crying, or screaming, or maybe crushing them all to his chest until the vision ends and he finds himself in some afterlife with his father, or nowhere at all. How long does he have? Is this some boon from the gods, a thanks for giving up his life? They should have given him an instruction manual. How can he make the best of it if he doesn’t know how long he has?

“Heatstroke, I think,” comes Iggy’s dry voice. He waves Noctis away and opens the car door. “Water.”

“We don’t have much left,” Gladio cautions.

“Do you want to explain to Lady Lunafreya how her fiancé collapsed within an hour of the city? Doesn’t paint the right picture, I think…” Ignis opens the trunk, begins to root around inside.

The block in Noct’s throat softens. Maybe he can speak. Maybe… “I’m fine.”

If anything, Prompto and Gladio stare at him harder.

“Dude,” Prompto says. “What’s wrong? You look like you’re about to faint.”

Noct wouldn’t waste his time like that, not when he could be looking at them. He drinks them in, the sight of them flushed and short-tempered and right there beside him like they were for so long. After a while it’s too much. He shakes his head, the screen of his hair closing him off momentarily. He wipes sweat off his brow. It all feels so familiar, like it’s all really happening again.

Ignis finds a canteen of water and presses it into Noct’s hand. Noct looks at it, feeling the familiar texture and weight in his hand. He twists off the top, drinks experimentally.

He lowers it. Everything seems so…

“Another mouthful, I think,” Iggy says.

Noct does as he’s told, then screws the top back on, hands the canteen back. “I said I was fine,” he says. He can’t pretend at the old petulance; he just sounds dazed. Should he playact for them? Pretend this is real? When will it go away? The thought tears at him, pulls the moment from him and positions it above him like one of his ancestors’ weapons, poised to strike. He’s ready for the blow, but seconds tick over: another, another, another.

He breathes in, out: waiting. The images don’t dissolve, and the beating sun overhead doesn’t dim.

Ardyn’s laughter echoes in his ears. Not summoned up, not some weird connection between them, but a memory. _I killed him_. He killed him, so he’s dead. They’re both dead, and this is… this is…

God, the guys would give him so much shit if they knew. _My version of heaven is being with you_. He almost cringes, almost smiles. He looks at all three of them, these visions sent to guide him onward, or whatever, and lets the matter be. If this is what he gets, this is what he gets.

“C’mon,” he says. This time he sounds like himself. “Don’t we have a car to push?”

None of them comment on the hitch in his voice, the only bubble of emotion that escapes with his eyes still dry—but they notice. He swallows, turns to face front.

“I can’t do it by myself.”

“As his highness commands…” Ignis says sardonically, and they all fall into place. They begin again, the scene so familiar it overwhelms Noctis. He doesn’t let himself be just overwhelmed though. He forces himself to notice the soft rubber crawl of the tires against tarmac, the heat, the surroundings. He looks and listens and smells. It’s all dust and the guys’ voices and the familiar scents and sounds of the car, but he breathes it in like it’s oxygen.

He doesn’t need oxygen. He’s dead—but the moments drag on, and on, and on. He expected to leave by now, to fade into some other vision, but the ground stays solid. Everything is blindingly, heart-stoppingly real.

They make it to Hammerhead before any kind of nebulous _beyond_.

Cindy comes from the same direction she did last time, and Cid interrupts at the same moment. Noct didn’t think he remembered all this, not this clearly, but it’s like hearing a familiar song: the lyrics come to him as it plays, previously forgotten but anticipated the moment before they’re sung, each line leading smoothly to the next. He watches his life unfold a second time, bears Cid’s scolding. Is it him, or was Cid more scathing last time? He doesn’t remember Cid blinking at him like that, stopping short.

“Prince Noctis may be suffering from a mild case of heatstroke,” Ignis offers Cid without prompting.

Always making excuses; Noct nearly smiles again. He misses them so much already, misses the real Ignis and Prompto and Gladio he left behind. The ones he said goodbye to—not these stand-ins. They’re memories, and they’re good ones, but that’s all they can be. They haven’t been through hell with him.

They’re not real. But they look and sound and act real, and it tears at him. How long now?

Not everything has changed in this dream. Cid still insists on making them scramble, and this time Noct suspects it has something to do with his dad and Cid’s time with him, and maybe a little bit with them all being from the city. It occurs to Noct that he might relive _everything_ , might be caught in some kind of loop—but that can’t be right. There was nothing in any prophecy about that. It’ll end soon, so he’d better enjoy this day he has. He wipes the sweat from his brow—again—and goes back through motions like half-remembered dance steps. Talking to Cindy, meeting Takka, stocking up on supplies. It all feels a bit like play-acting.

“You’re looking better,” Gladio says after they take out Cindy’s reapertails. Noct looks up, still surprised at how interactive the fantasy is. He looks down at his hands, his weapon disappearing. He _feels_ better. This part he’s used to, and it takes almost no brain power. Target weak spot, strike, get away. He could do it in his sleep.

Is that what this is? Sleep? Does he wait here until the gods insert his soul back into reality?

“He’d look better if it didn’t take him an hour to process everything we say,” Ignis says, coming up behind him. Iggy’s hand grips Noct’s shoulder, turns him to look at him. “Is everything all right, Noctis? Did something happen?”

 _I died_ , Noct imagined saying. _I had to leave you guys forever._

Forever had been a lot shorter than expected. It still stretches out ahead of him, and it’s almost getting annoying now. Why _can’t_ this be real? Why does it have to end? It’s not fair.

The guys gather up around him. Intervention time. Noct looks at them, all the familiar lines of their faces and the ones that aren’t there yet. Less pain lines around their mouths, he thinks.

Prompto grips his shoulders, peering into his face. “Who are you, and what have you done with Noct?”

Noct lets out an amused breath. “Done?”

 _I killed him, I suppose_.

“You were normal this morning.”

“This morning?”

“Yeah! When we said bye to your dad, you were being your normal self—”

“A punk,” Gladio puts in helpfully.

“—and now it’s like, where’s your head, man? Are you worried about something?”

He could come out with the truth—but even if these versions of his friends aren’t real, he can’t stand hurting them, and the truth would hurt. He goes for second-best. “I had a vision,” he says.

Prompto lets go of him, steps back. “Of what?”

Ha. Of everything—his entire life. It took years. He shakes his head. “The gods, I guess.”

“Whoa.”

“Were they trying to tell you something?” Gladio asks. The amusement has washed from his face.

“Not as far as I could tell,” Noct says. His chest feels tight. “We’ll find out, I guess.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s hard, that night, to go to sleep. They stay in the rentable caravan in Hammerhead after a day of errands, and Noct is reluctant to drop his cards when the others do. He wants to lengthen the day, somehow, to have it go on forever, but his body is tired, dreamt-up as it is. He lets his eyes close, overcome with grief all over again. Dying was meant to be his out; it was meant to be the end of these painful feelings.

 _Don’t make me lose them. Not again._ But he’s already lost them, and whatever this is will be over soon. It’s dark behind his eyelids. Perhaps it will always be dark. He lays curled on the too-small mattress, trapped in a vortex of sadness, and eventually the vision ends.

He sleeps.

 

 

* * *

 

 

 

“…think it’s normal?” Gladio asks from somewhere overhead.

“Time will tell, I suppose.” Ignis. “Let’s continue this outside.”

There are footsteps away. The screen door rattles as it shuts, then the click of another door closing locks out air and the others’ voices. Noct doesn’t open his eyes. He woke up. He woke up to… to the same place, the same time. His friends around him, like they’re not going to disappear.

His eyes burn.

“What the hell?” he asks. He doesn’t expect an answer, but he’d like one. His stomach is a pit of hope and horror, finally coming to terms with the impossible: that this is real, and happening, and his life now. He was prepared to die; getting used to the idea of living—living a time he’s already experienced—will take time. But also…

But also…

His body shakes. He closes his eyes as tightly as he can, curled up on one side, hands fisted by his face. But also, he gets to live. He gets to be with them again. _One more time._ Just one more night, he’d thought his last day on earth—and what does he get now? Until that train into a falling empire. Months, depending on how he can stretch it.

And what if he…

“Noct?”

Noct opens his eyes. They’re wet; he wipes them with a clumsy hand. “Mm?”

“You okay?”

Prompto is looking at him from his bed, the one that doubles as a couch. His eyes look shadowed.

“I’m…”

“It’s that dream, isn’t it? The one the gods sent you?” Prompto pushes off his covers, sits up. “What did you see?”

 “I saw…” Noct looks at Prompto. He’s so young here, now. Noct doesn’t want him to come to harm—his school friend, his stalwart cheerleader. Prompto worked so hard to keep their spirits up last time. He feels sick imagining him up on that cross, thinking he’s something broken or wrong.

“The future,” Noct finishes lamely. “I think I saw the future.”

Prompto leans forward, gripping his elbows for support. “And it was bad?”

Noct swallows. “There were a lot of bad things, yeah.” _Too many to count_.

“D’you think you could stop them?”

Pain lances through Noct. Stop them… could he? With foreknowledge, this go-round, could he protect his friends at least? Could he save Luna? Jared?

Can he go back right now and save his father?

“Noct?”

Noct shakes his head. “I don’t know. Maybe. What if something terrible happens by me changing it?”

Is he meant to consider this reality, or is it some playground inside his deteriorating mind as he dies? He’ll know more once he speaks to the gods. _They’ll_ know. He can’t dream them up the same way he could dream up his friends. Their presence was always a droning hum in his mind, bordering on painful. If _they_ don’t feel real, he’ll know.

And if they do feel real, then… then this is real, and he’s either doomed to make the same mistakes or gifted with a second chance. What can he change? Can he still save the world if he saves his father, his city?

A block forms in his throat. Somehow he doesn’t think his dad would have sent him away if his presence in Insomnia could have saved it. He doesn’t think he’s that protective. The empire was a boot waiting to crush the crown city under its heel, and something about it feels inevitable.

So does he let his dad die in this reality too?

“What about Lady Lunafreya?” Prompto asks. Noct’s eyes widen.

What is Prompto talking about? How can he know? “What about her?”

“Doesn’t she see the future, kinda? What if you ask her about it?”

Noct blinks, realising Prompto wasn’t talking about saving Luna from death. Prompto has no idea—but Noct does. If he can just change things, prepare better, he might…

He might actually manage, this time. Perhaps he can save Iggy’s eyes too, with the right amount of foresight. He knows exactly where events will happen, how to get there. This time he won’t be going in with nothing but good intentions.

 _This is a hallucination_ , he thinks. _There is no ‘this time’._ He tries to think it, anyway, but every breath of normal, slightly stale caravan air fights him. All his other visions felt so _momentous_. Why would he dream of Prompto with his face slightly swollen from sleep, and of a lumpy mattress and a fan with one blade slightly chipped? It’s hopeless to believe this is real, that he can hold onto it, but his hands ache to stop pushing it away.

“I’ll ask,” Noct says, “next time she sends Umbra.”

Prompto bounces on the mattress. “There! You look better already. Everything’s gonna be fine, you’ll see.”

Noct sits up, letting his feet drop onto the floor, and Prompto takes the chance to plop down next to him, nudging him with his shoulder. He’s waiting for him to agree.

“Hm? Hm?”

Noct smiles. For a moment he thinks he can play it off, just let Prompto be Prompto, but before he’s able to quash the impulse he’s unstooping, reaching out an arm to pull Prompto into his chest, hand in his unruly hair.

“Everything will be fine, huh?” he says over Prompto’s trapped head. He can’t see Prompto’s face, but this is Prompto: he won’t… judge. He’s good at sensing what people need from him, much better than Noctis is.

“Yeah! Everything.” An arm comes up around Noctis easily, giving the comfort Noct could never ask for. “Just wait. And ask Luna what she thinks.”

“I will.”

He lets go, deep in thought. If he does this—if he contacts Luna—it’ll mean he’s accepted this reality. He won’t just be coasting through a daydream. Yesterday he did everything better and again. Today… today maybe he’ll do things new. He’ll use what he knows, and hope it doesn’t destroy the world. He’ll try to make things better, maybe.

He can feel himself start to care, despite his efforts yesterday to just enjoy the ride. There’s fear in his gut at the thought of getting attached and invested only to disappear again, or to have it not be real—but he was already attached. These are his friends, even if they’re a different version of those same people, even if they’re memories. He’s scratched up enough; it doesn’t matter if the wounds are carved just an inch deeper.

He can’t let it matter, not when this might be real.

Prompto ruffles his hair.  “So you can stop frowning, Your Highness.”

Noct smiles. “Turn my royal frown upside down?”

“Yup. It makes you look like you’re having a bad heir day.”

Noct straightens, looks at Prompto. Their eyes meet. “Did you just…”

“Yep.”

“I’d expect that from Ignis,” Noct says, amusement bubbling in his stomach alongside the chasm joy in this universe opens up. _Where am I, what am I doing, how long do I have…_

“I stole it from him, actually.” Prompto grins. “Sometimes he jokes you’re having a good heir day when we’re watching you meet important people.”

For a moment Noct can’t even remember a time that might have happened. The last politician he met was Camelia, he thinks—but this is before that. Meeting with his dad’s people, their allies, reporters, maybe. He didn’t know Prompto and Ignis would ever have watched such an event together; the thought is odd, separates him from them not just temporally. He never knew what to do with that feeling, the divide between him and the others by virtue of birth. Now, in the face of greater separation, it seems minor.

Noct drags a hand through his hair. “You know I only have good heir days.”

Prompto laughs, jumps to his feet. “Oh yeah? That remains to be determined.” He sticks out a hand to help Noctis up.

Noct takes it.

 

 

* * *

 

 

Umbra finds them somewhere along the route that day, not exactly where he did last time. Things are already shifting, and it helps convince Noctis things might really go differently this time. It allows him to hope. The downside, of course, is that it’s hard for him to settle back into the dynamic with the guys. He’s too serious, too on edge.

His father will die not long from now.

“What will you tell her?” Ignis asks as Noct leans down to pet Umbra near an abandoned shack.

“Dearest Luna,” Prompto narrates. “Your eyelashes are like moonlight. I want to be strangled by your hair. Please hold me in your loving arms when I get to Altissia. Love and smooches, your Nocty Noct.”

Noct laughs, even though Prompto is trying to cover for him. He hasn’t told Ignis and Gladio about the future “vision”, and he won’t depending on what Luna says.

All these answers he waits for are a lot to expect from one person—but Luna is used to the weight of the world resting on her shoulders. He wishes he could change that.

It strikes him that she’s alive again too, in this world. That feels like a gift as certain as the guys being here with him. If he can save her…

“Are you gonna write something or just stare at the page?” Gladio asks from above him.

“Perhaps he’s considering Prompto’s message,” Ignis puts in, to hissed laughter. Noct glares up at them, though he’s unable to press the smile from his mouth.

“I’ve got a lot to say,” he says. “Go stand over there.”

Gladio looks at him. “Ending with _love and smooches_ is grounds for divorce, just so you know.”

“I won’t give her grounds for premarital divorce, promise. Go.”

The guys go. The spikes of their laughter pull at Noct’s mouth, make him remember what it was like to be happy, to be easy. He leans over the notebook; Umbra noses it.

“I’m going, I’m going.”

He begins to write. He quickly surpasses the length of his last message, even explaining everything as concisely as he can: that he knows about Ardyn, the prophecy, what’s meant to happen. That she died, and that eventually, he did too.

Pages fill with questions after that, and he has to stop himself from spiralling outward. Guilt fills him at laying this all back in her hands, but what’s he meant to do? Luna was always smarter, more insightful, wiser. She was always _older_ , though he supposes he grew older than she did eventually. Do the years in the crystal count?

His pen is stalled for a while as he thinks about this—until he shakes himself. He looks down at the page, where all that remains is to write some kind of sign-off.

 _The guys are joking about me signing this with ‘love and smooches’,_ he writes. _It feels so weird to be back with them. I haven’t told them about all this. I’m sorry for always relying on you._

None of that is useful information. He just needs to end this message, but—

_I do love you, Luna. If I can save you, this time, I’ll do whatever it takes. Please take care._

He signs it with just his name, and embarrassment he hasn’t felt in ages fills him. He can’t scratch out the _I do love you_ after writing it—it’ll just make it look even weirder and more sincere—but somehow his old feelings aren’t totally gone. He’s still in awe of her, after all this time. After literally dying. The thought amuses him. Though he now suspects the marriage was at least partially a sham to get him out of the city safely, part of him is still stumped she’d ever agree to that cover story, to the potential of being married to _him._

Writing to Luna makes him feel his body’s age: young. And inexperienced.

He waits for the flush to die down before attaching the book back to Umbra and standing.

“Ah,” says Ignis, noticing he’s done. “Was it _love and smooches_ after all, Your Highness?”

Noctis wanders up to them. “Nah. _Hugs and kisses_ , of course. Classic.”

“Of course,” Gladio says, laughter in his eyes. “Proud of you.”

“Well, _I’m_ disappointed,” Prompto says.

“Write your own letter next time,” Noct tells him.

“Maybe I will! Then you’ll be sorry.”

“Sorry for Lady Lunafreya having to read it, I expect,” Ignis teases.

Noct smiles, but he _is_ sorry—for putting all that weight on her. He remembers, suddenly, that they’re near the time Luna will end up in the crown city; what if the message causes more disaster? What if she dies in Insomnia’s downfall now that she has all this foreknowledge?

_Shit!_

Noct looks behind him, but Umbra is already gone. How had he forgotten? Why did he think Luna would be safe in Altissia? He’d _known_. He knew she would be in Insomnia! But it just…

It slipped his mind. Because Luna was safe, until Altissia. Because she survived it all once. The beginning of his journey is a fog in his brain, only coming to him in bits and pieces as he sees all the sights again. How could he _forget_?

Forewarned is forearmed—but forearmed doesn’t mean _safe_. And even if he can’t save Luna, she’s the one who gives him the ring.

If Luna dies early, the world might end too.

_But I already saved it._

Is this his life now? To be caught in a loop of world-ending events, always scrambling? He stands shocked and horrified at himself. His ignorance, how easily it came to him to just dump on Luna. He may have saved the world, but he’s barely ever stood on his own two feet. How could he think he’d be able to save everyone now, just him working alone?

He looks at the guys. Gladio will hate him if he finds out. Noct letting his own father die in the city’s destruction is one thing—but Gladio’s father dies too. Perhaps Insomnia’s destruction isn’t inevitable.

_No. It is. You saw the empire…_

The fall is inevitable, then—but perhaps the damage can be minimised. Everyone thinks he and his friends are gone. If he just stays on the fringes—if he slips in and out and saves whoever he can…

The others have been talking, and they look at him now.

“You’re doing it again,” Prompto informs him.

“Sorry.” He looks at them, all three of them. “Guys I—”

Their silence turns expectant as he stops himself. Solitary insects cry out around them in the desert heat; he hunches his shoulders.

“I think I messed up.”

“Not with your sign-off, I take it?” Ignis says. He’s smiling, but he looks serious.

“Spit it out,” Gladio says.

Noctis nods, swallowing. He’s already made one big mistake, trying to keep things consistent. He was never a lone agent in anything—only in dying. Only in walking up those steps, sitting down on an empty throne. These guys aren’t his friends from then, the ones he left outside the citadel. They haven’t been through fire and ice with him yet, and everything he changes now wipes the people they once became from existence—but he can’t help dragging them into this. He can’t do it alone. He’s never been able to.

“I saw the future,” he says. “Insomnia falling. I thought I couldn’t prevent it. I wanted to ask Luna for help deciding what to do, but then I remembered…”

 _Remembered._ Is he still pretending this is a vision? He doesn’t want to tell them the mind-bending truth—not yet. Eventually. “I mean, I saw her there. And I realised, what if I just made it worse? We need to—I need to—I don’t know. We need to save who we can. But I’m afraid I’m just messing up worse. I’m afraid the world will end—”

“Whoa,” Gladio says. “Who said anything about the world, Noct?”

“It feels that way,” Noctis says. “I need my father’s ring, or things will… end. I’m not meant to be there, but if we stay hidden… I don’t know. Maybe this is worse, but will you help?”

“Of course we will,” Prompto says. His eyes are wide—regretting not asking more this morning, Noct guesses.

“I don’t think we can stop the city from falling entirely,” Noctis says, straightening. He looks at them all. What if he loses one of them trying to save someone else? He can’t think about it—can’t bear to. He’ll have to die again, if this story draws to its natural conclusion, but he needs them to live. It’s his only comfort. “But we can do something.”

 “And you’re telling us this now,” Ignis says. He folds his arms.

“I thought it might be fake.” _I thought you were fake_. Perhaps they still are, but Noct refuses to bet on it. He won’t let his world end in any version of reality. “I wanted Luna to tell me what to do.”

“That’s too much insight into your future together, man,” Prompto says, smiling weakly. He looks sick, like the reality of the situation has finally caught up. Noctis lets out a breath, more amused than the lukewarm joke warrants.

“Very funny. So we head to the city?”

“We’ll have to sneak in,” Ignis says. “If it’s imperative we stay hidden..?”

“I think so. The empire can’t know where we are. The peace talks are a sham.”

The guys look grim. “Not unexpected,” Ignis says, “but disappointing nonetheless.”

“In and out, saving who we can,” Gladio says. Noct is relieved at how easily he’s accepted this, his clear gaze. Often, Gladio feels like the voice of his conscience—the voice telling him when he’s messing up. Gladio’s eyes are fierce now as he looks at Noctis, not questioning him. “Yeah?”

Noct nods. Saving everyone they can—except, perhaps, the line of Lucis. He holds no hope for himself, and almost none for his father. But to see him again, one last time…

“Everyone we can,” Noctis agrees.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To my dear Nanananali: Merry Christmas. I wrote you the most depressing gift ever. OUT OF LOVE!!
> 
> NOTE: while my unedited style is fairly polished, this hasn't had its customary second go-over yet. I was writing like the wind to finish in time, and will give it a wee edit later if you want to check back in a few days!

Sneaking into Insomnia should be easy for a multitalented group like theirs, but it’s not. They waste a day getting in, and the ticking hand of time winds Noct’s muscles up tighter and tighter. He has a headache he fights hard to ignore, and he keeps thinking how much longer he has until his dad is killed.

How long until Luna is thrown into danger?

How long until the city falls?                                                              

He doesn’t know if the sick feeling inside of him is physical or psychological. Being in the capital pre-destruction is weirder than being in a demon-torn landscape filled with familiar structures; somehow bright sunshine overhead and parents tugging stray children with ice cream cones along is worse, feels worse. Why does it feel worse?

They hide in the rafters of a warehouse in an outlying district, waiting for nightfall. Shafts of light illuminate the guys’ faces. They look anxious, though Gladio’s brows lift when he catches Noct looking; he smiles confidently, which must mean Noct’s anxiety shows.

“Hey, this’d be a good fake-out if we’d planned it,” Gladio says. “If anyone asks…”

“ _Totally_ part of the plan,” Prompto finishes. “I gotcha.”

Noct manages a smile. Why does he feel so bad? Gladio and Prompto are right. This is a good tactic, an opportunity. Noct has never been a coward—he doesn’t _think_ he’s been a coward—but something inside him tugs away from the city, back to the journey he knows. Is it just fear? He convinces himself it is.

The wait goes on, and on, and on, and then the light begins to fade. They’re fed and rested, and the streetlights are just winking on as they begin their crawl to the Citadel. They’re still nowhere near when fireworks start to go off.

Noct jumps and looks up. Colours burst against a black sky, raining down over the city in streamers before disappearing. It’s so beautiful it makes him ache. In his world, this was the last night Insomnia had as a free city. In this new world…

_I can do it_ , Noct thinks, forcing steel into his limbs. _I can save this_.

It doesn’t feel like it, but he can. This is just some new species of fear. He’ll reach his father, tell him whatever he needs to know, and things will get fixed. He’d think about how to fix them, except as they get closer to the Citadel his head hurts so badly it’s all he can do to put one foot in front of the other. It’s worse after the pause to look at fireworks, when they stop looking up and start moving again, Prompto in front and Gladio bringing up the rear. Noct starts to worry he’ll have to ask Gladio to carry him, or to steal a car.

He stumbles, and Ignis catches him.

“Noct?” Ignis says. He lowers them down, kneels next to him. His grip on Noct’s arm is tight. “Noctis, can you hear me?”

Noct waves away his voice. “I can hear. I’m fine. Just dizzy.”

“More visions?”

“Yeah.”

Prompto runs back from point, kneeling with them. “What did you see?!”

“Nothing useful. Come on, we look suspicious. People will see.”

“With those on?” Prompto says, gesturing at the display. “Nah. Everyone’s looking up.”

Noct looks up too, thinking of all the people who died with this display as one of their last memories. So many lives cut short, not just his father’s. Earlier, Prompto had gone around letting people know evacuation routes, telling them to be aware in case of disaster. He said they were receptive to it; Noct wishes he could have simply told them to leave right now, but it would just be seen as fear-mongering. People never wanted to believe disaster was a personal danger to them; it was meant to be something that happened to other people.

Footsteps along a side street get them all up and moving, attempting to look not like a group and not like Crownsguard. Noct hopes his painful steps look like drunken stumbling—just some guy on his way back from a party. Ignis keeps a hand on his arm, steadying but not lifting. How long can Noct keep it up? The pain is like the pain then—the pain the gods deliver like a gift, like he asked for it. Are they sending it now?

“Isn’t this what you want?” he rasps under his breath, too low for Ignis to hear. “We’ll get through this faster this time. I’ll have the ring. I’ll still do it all.”

There’s no response, though Ignis leans in. “Did you say something?”

Noct shakes his head. He doesn’t want to acknowledge what seems clear: that the gods don’t want Insomnia to be saved, that he’s meant to retrace his steps from last time and not forge a new path. They know better than he does, maybe—but he’ll fight them.

It’s the last thing he thinks before he blacks out.

 

* * *

 

 

He wakes in daylight, sweat soaked and groaning. His vision is too blurry to make out the faces looking down at him. Is he sick? Dying? Is Insomnia…

“The city,” he says. His voice sounds like it’s coming from far away. “Is it—did it fall?”

“Not yet,” comes Iggy’s voice. Noct lets out a breath of relief, sitting up.

“We have to get to my father,” he says. He’s on the floor of what looks like a classroom, the desks shoved to one side. Clever: no one is going to be in school today, on the day of the talks. Nausea claws up from his stomach.

Iggy’s hand presses on his shoulder, as if to shove him back down, but he doesn’t quite yet. “I don’t think that’s wise.”

“It’s necessary.” He closes his mouth on a hurl. “I need the ring.” _I need to talk to him one last time._

Is he looking after the city? Or just himself?

“Noct.” Gladio looks at him. “I don’t think you can.”

Gladio looks concerned. That’s good; he hasn’t moved on into _pissed off_ yet, isn’t going to accuse Noct of shirking his duty.

“Where’s Prompto?” Noct asks, not just for distraction.

“Doing his civic duty,” Gladio says. He tips his head at a window. “Trying to reach people, tell them where to be. We’ve got a car now, so we can move in, but it’s no good. The closer you get to the Citadel the worse you get. Like you’re not meant to be there. Tell us what to do instead.”

It’s not what Noct wants, but maybe this is the solution

“I’ve been in contact with the Glaives,” Ignis says. “Using a voice distorter, so you needn’t worry. I let them know to expect dissension.”

Noct blinks at him. “Among the ranks?”

“Your vision leads me to believe there’s more at play—that the Empire has infiltrated farther than we know. Insomnia wouldn’t fall in a single day, not if it held firm.”

“Telling the Glaives there are traitors, though?” Gladio says, sounding on edge. He looks like he disagrees with Ignis, which doesn’t happen often. “That’s not gonna help. The traitors are organised; the good people aren’t.”

“Better than a knife in the back. They’ll know to be on their guard.”

“If the message reaches people who need to be reached,” Gladio says.

“I was careful with who I contacted.”

Noct’s shoulders are tight with tension. “Luna knows more too. Maybe she’s been able to… do something. Talk to dad.”

_Maybe she has the ring already_. That way her survival is tantamount to the world’s. She’s probably moving in new ways, with the information she has. What has she managed to piece together? Is she safe, or in more danger than last time?

And here he is, not even able to crawl up the Citadel steps without fainting.

“Feels like we’re just making a mess,” Gladio says. “Tell us what to do, Prince.”

“You’re right,” Noct says. “I made too much of a mess already. We’ve already changed things, and I don’t know how. We need to save Luna, get the ring. You could save your dad, Gladio.”

“You saw him?”

Noct nodded.

“Iris?”

“I don’t think she needs saving, but like I said, I fucked up.”

“Not yet,” Gladio says. He stands. “I’ll go check things out. Keep the car, for if you need to get out quick. I’ll find my own way.”

“By stealing another car?” Ignis asks.

“Desperate times.” Gladio waves and moves off. He flashes them his phone, the message clear: keep me updated, and I’ll do the same. They let him leave.

A long silence follows. Noct can’t stop thinking about his father, how they’re both alive but can’t get to each other. He wonders if the gods will strike down Gladio now that he might be trying to get the ring. Gladio knows not to use it, but if Noct can’t go anywhere near the Citadel conscious, why should his friends be able to?

He tries to ignore the possibility that he was right all along: that this is some vision that’ll end if he messes up.

“Noctis.”

Noct looks up. Ignis has stopped threatening to push him back down, but there’s worry in his eyes.

“Perhaps you’re not meant to be here,” Ignis says.

Noctis nods. There’s a long silence.

“You still want to attempt it?” Ignis asks.

Surprise surges through Noct. “You’d let me?”

“You are the prince, aren’t you?”

He is. Once upon a time—a few days ago, in another timeline—he’d even been confident in that assertion. Then fate or gods or Ardyn had muddied the water and turned him back into a bumbling teenager. It’s hard to think around headaches and doubt, but not impossible.

It’s time to stop letting his insecurities rule him.

“Let’s get Prompto,” he says. “Let’s drive. You can drag me if you have to, but I need to see my father.”

Ignis smiles. “Welcome back, Your Highness.”

 

 

* * *

 

 

It’s like a dam has broken. Noct feels sick, and there’s a buzzing in his head, but it’s no longer insurmountable. Wheels squeak as Ignis manoeuvres the car in the direction of the Citadel. He only has to swallow bile once during the trip—but they still don’t make it all the way, because a few blocks from the Citadel things start exploding. In the rearview mirror, airships start to fall from the sky.

“Oh shit,” says Prompto—which are Noct’s feelings, more or less.

“There was nothing we could have done,” Ignis says sensibly.

Prompto sets his jaw. “If it wasn’t for the visions, we wouldn’t even be here. You’re right.”

“Do you think we’ve saved anyone?” Noct asks.

“Definitely!” Prompto says. “I was very convincing. City’s evacuating as we speak, I’m sure.”

“They won’t,” Noct says. He looks at the familiar shimmer in the sky. “As long as the wall’s up. It’ll always seem safer to be in here than out there.”

“Let’s pray it stays up,” Ignis says. There are too many people crowding the street for him to drive, now, and he pulls up against the sidewalk. Screams in the distance may come from confused witnesses—or they might come from people in real trouble. Noctis wants to jump out of the car, but he forces himself to stay slow and in control. This is their fake out. This is the moment they reappear in the capital, having already left. Capture isn’t an option, and neither is being killed. The only person he trusts not to kill him is Ardyn, and that’s not a lot to go on.

“Can you walk?” Prompto asks Noct, looking across the back seat.

Noct opens the door. When he sets foot on the pavement he doesn’t fall on his face. “Yeah.”

It’s not a lie; he walks out of the car into the crowd, and there’s no force pushing him over. The tension has loosened, and he has no idea why. Because whatever was holding him back has realised he’ll push through, or because those airships started falling?

Someone runs into him, knocking the air from his lungs. His shoulder aches with it, and suddenly he’s back in Altissia, looking up at Luna through a crowd. He looks around for her, but she isn’t here—just the future-memory of her, and people crushing in on all sides. No one recognises him or the uniform in the panic.

Shots are fired across the crowd; Noct watches someone fall. He’s meant to be incognito, meant to not draw attention to himself, but he starts to move more by instinct than intent. He climbs onto the parked car and sends his blade in the direction of the shot, where an imperial officer has opened fire. It’s so easy to jump into action, to send his blade into the man’s back in a two-warp move and wrench it back out. It’s less easy to warp out in time when the man’s friends—many in plainclothes—open fire on Noct.

“The Glaives! The Glaives are here!”

There’s a cry of relief, and for the nth time Noct is glad his father kept him out of the public eye. A cry of _the prince is here_ could be infinitely worse, blow his cover entirely—

“That’s the prince! Prince Noctis!”

He warps to the edge of a white stone building, then runs along its side, where the line of an ornamental gutter sticks out between floors. He hears the structure crunch behind him as shots fire into it and send rubble flying, and it’s only a matter of time before one of those shots hits true. He has to keep moving—in areas where stray bullets won’t hit the panicking civilians, who seem to have forgotten they’re standing in a warzone.

When he glances at them he sees phones flashing. _Great._ Do they know there are no celebrity magazines in the empire? There won’t be anyone to sell the pics to tomorrow—

He warps, and hears shouts from the people shooting. Ignis and Prompto have finally shouldered past the crowd and are laying down cover fire, distracting from Noct.

“Kill the prince!” he hears a civilian say—an outlander, by the look of his clothes. The empire is working with the outlands? Noct shouldn’t be surprised—but he is. Or is it merely an imperial soldier in disguise? No time to ask and find out; he phases through the outlander’s bullet and warp strikes, knife hitting true. Blood blooms where Noct’s weapon pulls out, and the look on the outlander’s face is surprise.

_Sorry_ , Noct thinks. He sees Glaives join the fray, and remembers Ignis’s words hours ago about the Glaives having traitors. It’s a good thing he does, because it makes him turn when one of them is at his back. The knife glances his arm, makes him bleed, but it doesn’t thud into him the way it was meant to. He twists, pulls the Glaive as he passes by and draws his blade along his neck.  

The Glaive falls down dead. On instinct Noct drops onto his haunches, and avoids a swing. He doesn’t have time to retaliate as the Glaive follows his motion down, forces him to roll back and away. He bumps into something—a corpse by the feel of it—and staggers to his feet, the Glaive in pursuit, and then like a hundred, thousand times before a blade the size of a person gets between him and danger, sweeps his foe away like it’s nothing.

_Gladio_.

“What happened to incognito?” Gladio asks. He’s in the thick of the fray now, his bulk drawing enemies. He keeps the close-range ones between him and any potential sharpshooters.

“I happened,” Noct says.

Gladio laughs. “Stop trying to sound cool!”

“Yeah, that’s Gladio’s job!” Prompto yells.

Noct laughs too, at peace for a moment—and then he sees the sky flicker. It chills him through. It isn’t the sky flickering—it’s the wall. The wall his dad has given life and limb for. _No!_

“I’m going in,” Noct says.

“It’s crawling with imperials and traitors,” Ignis says. “You won’t know friend from foe.”

“I’ll know my dad,” Noct says, and he charges ahead. “Save who you can, when you can!” he yells back at them, hoping his meaning is clear: he doesn’t need them to follow. He doesn’t need anything except to talk to his dad before it’s too late. Just one last time. He’ll face the gods again, disappear into the crystal again, give his life again—but he’ll demand this one last thing. His teeth clench, but the headache he expects at any moment has disappeared. He warps through halls of corpses and enemies locked in combat. He doesn’t stop to help, though the distraction of his presence draws enemies away from allies. He wishes he could summon help, but this body hasn’t faced gods. All it has is the training he left home with, and he uses it to dispatch the people who choose to follow him. How far to where his dad fell last time? Will he be in the same place? How is Noct supposed to know?

On instinct, Noct heads for the passages. Last time, his father had managed to give Luna the ring, and Luna had escaped. She wouldn’t have been able to use the front door.

He passes a fallen soldier in the hallway, and the next thing he sees is Glauca standing over his father. Glauca’s blade descends—and Regis rolls away. _Still alive!_

“Get away!” Noctis yells, and he warps into a suit of armor. His blade doesn’t strike true; he hasn’t been this bad at fighting since—well, since now. Since this day, in another lifetime. Fear makes him an idiot, running on instinct, and Glauca very nearly takes him out with his next blow.

“Noctis!” he hears his father yell. Just that: just his name, and Noct swallows a sob. The panic in his father’s voice shouldn’t be comforting, but it is. Hearing his father’s fear means he doesn’t have to be scared anymore. Wasn’t that always how it was? His father worried for him so he didn’t have to; he’s missed having a father, more than he knew.

“So it was true!” Glauca says, voice hard and tinny beneath his suit of armor. “The Crown Prince, come back to die.”

“Noctis…” Regis has stood up, with some difficulty. Noct sees dark blood against his clothes.

“I’ve come back to kill you,” Noct tells Glauca. He tries to remember himself, and what he knows. He’s not the useless boy this Regis said goodbye to a few days ago.

“Leave!” Regis tells Noct. “Now. Follow the others—”

_The others._ Noct looks down at his dad’s hand—at missing fingers. There’s no ring. Has Luna already been by? Is that who his father is protecting?

“Help me kill him,” Noct says. “I’m not leaving.”

“ _Go!_ ” Regis commands, and Noct sees him brace himself to set a barrier, but he jumps before he can be closed out of the fight. Glauca takes the chance to dive at Regis, but Noct gets in his way, swipes at the hinges of Glauca’s heavy suit and only manages to ding him.

_I need something bigger_ , Noct thinks, summoning up the sword he never quite mastered, a replica of Gladio’s. Its weight pulls at his arms and shoulders, reminding him of this body’s weakness.

“Come, then,” Noctis says. He doesn’t want Glauca near his father. “Come kill me.”

The next flurry of blows passes in a blur, jumping off the walls of the circular room, following Glauca and trying not to get in the way of his father. Regis is wounded, slower than he should be, but he’s fought longer than even the old version of Noct had. No movement is wasted.

When Glauca aims true for Noct’s heart, too fast for Noct to see, Regis doesn’t waste movement either.

He simply gets in the way.

Glauca’s triumph is short-lived. Another Noct would be distracted seeing his father fall, but this one has already lost his father once. He knows Regis’s life, and his own, are forfeit.

But Glauca—Glauca has no prophecy saying whether he lives or dies. And Noct knows which he’d prefer.

As his father falls to his knees, Noct switches weapons. He gets the engine blade up and into the crook below Glauca’s helmet, and watches red blood start to spill as he wrenches it out and back in. He keeps stabbing, and stabbing, and eventually the suit is just standing by itself. When it starts to fall, Noct makes sure it doesn’t fall on his father.

He turns.

“Noctis…”

“Dad,” Noct says, dropping to where his father lies. Regis is clutching at his chest, badly injured but still alive.

“You weren’t meant to come back. Please. Please…”

“I know what hangs in the balance,” Noct says, putting a hand over his father’s. His eyes sting and spill, but he does nothing to stop the tears. “I know I need to live. And die.”

Regis looks up at him, eyes bloodshot—pained. “And die…?”

“I’ve done it. Dad, I did it. And then I came back.” He looks down at his father, dying again—because he’s meant to. Because the gods demand it. “I don’t know what to do.”

He’d expected his father to be horrified, to disbelieve him—but Regis smiles. “You’ve done it?”

“You believe me?”

“Here you are…” There was more coming, but a cough cut it short. “There are many unbelievable things. Luna… has the ring… she’s with a group of loyal soldiers, headed out of the city. To you, Noctis.”

“I’ll save her,” Noct says. “I promise.”

Regis retracts his hand from under Noct’s. “You did it before…” He places a bloody palm against the side of Noct’s face. “You must have been so brave. My son, the hero.”

Noct’s eyes spill again, and he takes a laboured breath. “Yeah. Some hero. My first act as king: dying. And now I have to do it again.”

“You really came back…” Regis says, and Noct doesn’t know whether he means to the capital or through time. Regis’s eyes glaze over; he blinks to clear them. “You… understand?”

“I don’t understand anything,” Noct says. Is this some part of the prophecy too? Some part he doesn’t know, where he keeps reliving these years? Did his father know more?

Regis shakes his head; it looks like it pains him. When his eyes open again he looks even further away. “Me. You understand… why…” Pain is stark in his father’s face. Not from the wounds, Noct thinks. “Why I didn’t tell…”

“I understand,” Noct says, chest tight. It had never occurred to him that there were things his father wished he could have said; his head had always been full of his own grief, his own list of things he wished he could have told his father. “Thank you, dad. For everything.”

Regis smiles weakly. “Not _Your Majesty_?”

Something between a laugh and a sob chokes Noct. He wipes at his eyes and speaks. “No offense. You don’t look very regal just now.”

“I suppose… that’s your job now…”

Noct can’t breathe. He manages a rattling gasp, keeping a hand over his father’s wound pressing down. Not long now, but he wishes time could stretch. That they could get all the time they need to talk to each other. Perhaps it wouldn’t be possible in a thousand lifetimes, a thousand do-overs. Why had the gods—or his ancestors—denied him his chance?

_Because my father needed to die_ , he thinks. They’d held him back until the first wound was inevitable; he can feel it. His body knows it, or perhaps his soul, connected as it is to those unknown forces. He doesn’t waste time hating them, though in a later moment he might.

Regis’s eyes are mostly closed. They stay locked on Noct’s face, drinking him in as he gasps for his last breaths. His face is slack and bleached of colour; his hand grips Noct’s one last time.

His next words are lost in the gusting of breath, merely a sigh, but Noct thinks he hears _my son_ in it. He clenches his teeth against more tears, knowing they won’t help. When he squeezes his father’s hand, his father doesn’t grip back. He’s gone.

Noct sets the hand holding his over the wound and presses it there. Like that his dad looks peaceful, ready for sleep.

Had he looked this peaceful before? Noct bends his head over him.

“Noct!”

It’s Ignis’s voice, echoing down the hall. “We have to leave! There are bombs—airships—if we don’t get you out now we might never—”

Ignis stops abruptly. “The king…”

“Is dead,” Noct says. He stands up, wiping his father’s blood off on his shorts. He wipes his face again—snot and tears. He hopes his dad didn’t hold it against him in his last moments. “I’m ready.”

“Prompto found a flier,” Ignis says. There’s no more substance to his voice; he sounds comatose.

“Let’s go, then.” Noct looks down the passageway. Luna escaped—with a group of loyal Glaives. He’s tempted to run after them, but how long ago did they pass?

He lets it go. His father was right: he needs to survive, at least for now. Ignis takes his arm and tugs him along like a child. He feels like a child, until they exit the Citadel and the city is in ruins. Again. Active battle kicks him awake once more; Gladio pulls him into the hovering craft Ignis leads him to.

“Did you see the king?” Gladio asks.

Noct nods.

“And…”

“He didn’t make it.” _He was never going to._

Gladio’s face sets. “And—my father?”

“I didn’t see him. I’m sorry.”

Gladio shakes his head. “I’m the one who’s sorry. Come on. Strap in. Prompto has no idea how to fly this thing.”

“Hey!” Prompto yells from the pilot’s seat, but he sounds subdued.

“We can’t fly the whole way,” Ignis says as they seat themselves. “Too risky, with all the fighting, but we need to get you away…”

“I understand,” Noct says. He feels dead—but he got what he wanted. He doesn’t think his father smiled at the end, last time. It’s something.

 The craft moves off. There’s a lurch, and then they’re zooming between buildings in an imperial ship, heading for the city’s outskirts. The buzz of the engine helps fill the silence.

He looks down at his father’s blood staining his hands, and tries to be grateful for a second chance that feels like a death march.


End file.
